In June 2012, the company acquired two Kansas projects under development in Ford, Gray and Finney counties from local developer Zephyr Wind Power, and in the first week of this year, Infinity finalized the purchase of the Pioneer Wind Project in Ford County, Kan., from Clipper Windpower Development.

Combined, the two acquisitions have the potential to produce over 1.5 GW of wind energy, Infinity Wind Power says.

“These acquisitions bring Infinity’s total development pipeline in western Kansas to over 2.5 GW,” says Infinity Wind Power CEO Matt Riley. “We are making these investments in western Kansas in anticipation of future transmission-line infrastructure reaching the region. Kansas has been a strong leader nationally for the wind industry, and we hope that continues through the rest of the decade.”

Infinity plans to interconnect these projects to the Grain Belt Express Clean Line transmission line, a high-voltage direct-current transmission line currently being developed by Clean Line Energy Partners. The transmission line will collect 3.5 GW of low-cost wind energy from the central and southern plains and export that power to markets in Missouri, Indiana and points farther east.

The Grain Belt Express transmission line is scheduled to begin construction as early as 2015 and be energized in 2018. The wind projects in Finney, Ford, Gray and Hodgeman counties are scheduled to start construction by 2016 in order to ensure that they will be operational in 2018, when the energy is able to flow to those new markets.

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